Written by | Fiesta ST
Edit | Ya Lan
The Bull Demon King SUPRA is a famous sports model under Toyota. The first generation was born in 1978 and the fourth generation was discontinued in 2002, and at the Geneva Motor Show in March 2018, Toyota announced the resurrection of the GR SUPRA concept car. Two years later, in November 2020, toyota sports brand "GR" and the flagship sports model of the series "GR SUPRA" officially entered the Chinese market.
On April 28, Toyota unveiled a new SUPRA, which excited the lovers of the "Bull Devil" - this new model for the European market not only reduced the weight of 38.3 kg, making the whole car more sporty, but also specially equipped with a 6MT manual transmission.
In fact, Toyota Usa also announced the news of the 2023 North American version of the SUPRA earlier, and the 2023 North American version of the SUPRA also provides the option of 6MT transmission.
The main purpose of the European version of the enhanced SUPRA is to reduce the weight of the body, and the use of a 6MT manual transmission is enough to reduce the new car by 21.8 kg. At the same time, the new car has also been upgraded mainly for driving control. The rear wheels are significantly wider in the rim, while an aerodynamic kit is also added. With wider rear wheel size and a tire size of 275/30 R19 (255/35 R19 for front tires), handling is effectively improved with the help of the Brembo brake system. Compared to the automatic model, the tail tag of the new model SUPRA was upgraded to red to highlight its manual transmission identity.
The enhanced SUPRA model is still powered by the BMW B58 series 3.0T in-line six-cylinder engine, which can produce up to 387 hp and peak torque of 500 Nm. At the same time as the launch of manual transmission models in Europe and the United States, Toyota said that the reason for this approach is to meet the strong demands and expectations of our customers (in order to meet the strong demands and expectations of our customers).
The automatic version of SUPRA has been officially listed in China in April last year, the 2.0T model guidance price of 496,000 yuan, the 3.0T model guidance price of 626,000 yuan, due to the difficulty of a car, there is also a phenomenon of price increase in some areas. Although there is no exact news at present, whether the manual version of the model will also be imported into the Chinese market, but from the enthusiasm shown by netizens, the manual version of the "Bull Devil King" may be more tight if it enters China.
And this also leads to a topic that has long been debated by Chinese car fans: Does the manual transmission model still have the value of existence?
In fact, before the launch of the manual version of the "Bull Devil King", the manual gear was gradually defeated in the competition with the automatic gear. Looking at today's Chinese car market, manual transmission models have become less and less, especially after the fourth-generation Honda Fit only provides automatic gear, so that friends who love manual transmission models have less and less room to choose.
In the eyes of fans who truly find driving fun, the manual has an irreplaceable charm. The manual transmission with high transmission efficiency can appear to be accelerating quickly and very energetically in actual use. At the same time, it does not need to be forced by the shift logic set by the manufacturer, and it is relatively free. Coupled with the sensory stimulation brought about by the "flowing clouds" action when changing gears, the driving pleasure of the manual gear is difficult to match in the automatic gear. At the same time, it is difficult for the manual gear to go wrong, and the cycle of replacing the lubricating oil is calculated in "10,000 kilometers", and the cost of use is very low.
However, this is not the case for a considerable number of automatic transmission owners, who believe that manual transmission owners are "high-end cars" that cannot afford automatic transmissions and will choose manual transmissions.
In the eyes of automatic transmission advocates, the significance of the existence of manual gear is simply that the driving school coach uses it to torture novices. Even in intense driving, automatic transmissions can push the limits of human control. For example, the new generation of gearboxes carried by BMW and Jaguar, forced downshift, automatic oil replenishment, these ordinary people are difficult to complete the action gearbox can be easily solved. In contrast, the automatic transmission allows the driver to keep more attention on the steering wheel.
Whether the choice of manual gear is because of feelings or because of poverty has become a classic question in the automotive industry.
If the opinion of car fans is that the benevolent see the wise, then the attitude of the manufacturer is obviously more telling. At the same time of "consumption upgrade", in this era when automatic gears are becoming more and more mainstream, manual gears have become sentiments and Didi drivers choose, manual gears that require cumbersome operations are so "not high-end". In luxury brands, manual gears are almost extinct. In the mainstream market, the number of automatic models has long exceeded that of manual transmission.
With the development of the times, some of the advantages that used to belong to manual transmissions have become less obvious. In the early years, the types and technologies of automatic transmissions were not as good as they are now, when manual transmissions had considerable advantages in fuel consumption due to the small number of automatic transmissions (such as the classic Aisin 4AT) and the low efficiency of hydraulic torque converter transmissions. However, with the continuous increase of automatic transmission gears in recent years, as well as the continuous popularization of dual clutch and CVT, the disadvantage of automatic transmission in terms of fuel consumption is already very small compared to manual transmission, and even in some scenarios, 8AT and 9AT can be more fuel-efficient than manual transmission.
What is even more fatal is that the manual transmission is no longer in line with the development of the times. New energy vehicles are becoming more and more popular, but both pure trams and hybrid vehicles are completely unable to adapt to manual gears; autonomous driving technology requires vehicles to be able to control vehicles with a high degree of automation, and manual transmissions are difficult to match. In the case of Fit, with the Honda SENSING system, it has functions such as collision avoidance and active cruise, and these highly automated auxiliary driving functions are almost completely contradictory to pure, direct manual transmission.
Nowadays, it seems that the value of the manual transmission may only be reflected in the performance car of the GR SUPRA, which is small and pure, and is only for the pleasure of driving.
Finally, we hope to see SUPRA for 6MT in China.